Why are Dr's so Reluctant to Properly Test People for Asthma?

Hello, everyone. I apologize if there are any typos in this post or if I don't sound like myself. I'm currently typing this in a hotel after we had my dear grandfather's funeral today. He passed on the 25th last month due to cancer, but at least he won't be in the nursing home anymore after 8 years and we at least got to see him recently at least once before and after he died.

On the bright side, I got to see family that I have not seen in years due to covid and some in over a decade. It turns out that many of my family members on both sides of my extended family (thankfully not in my immediate family besides me).

My aunt has Hashimoto's and developed asthma after having covid and inflamed lungs, my little cousin got diagnosed with asthma (albeit, the doctors did a poor job testing her), and my older sister who I have not seen since I was a small child developed asthma in college.

When my aunt and my cousin came to their doctor with their concerns about my cousin's inability to breathe and run properly like she used to, the doctors simply told them that she didn't have asthma. No pulmonary function test, no exercise test, no allergy test for my cousin. Just a simple presumption. My aunt and my cousin were understandably frustrated, and I am sick and tired of doctors assuming that you have to have a history of asthma to develop asthma.

My asthma diagnosis was 15 years late, partly because my asthma was silent with no wheezing until I developed a chronic cough in my teens, but mostly because the doctors didn't bother to even consider asthma as a possibility. I've came to my doctors with countless concerns of being unable to breathe properly and fully, but because they did not have a recorded history of my asthma symptoms because they didn't bother to even test me and only gave me more allergy medicines that weren't helping because I'm an asthmatic, they didn't even consider asthma to be a possibility. It was only when my symptoms got as bad as they are now, when they finally heard my asthma, then they did something about it. No PFT, blood, or exercise, or any other formal test, just an albuterol rescue inhaler. Then it became a flovent inhaler with the rescue inhaler, then 5 days of prednisone for an emergency treatment with Zofran to keep me from throwing it up, then Singulair, then BREO 100/25mcg, Singulair, and a nebulizer with more albuterol, and finally BREO 200/25mcg, Singulair, rescue inhaler, and allergy shots filled with all 40 environmental allergens I tested positive for. I never had a PFT test until I visited the pulmonologist where they instructed me improperly on how to blow in the tube. You are supposed to take a deep breath in after you run out of air, not continue struggling to exhale even after there's nothing left, like the pulmonologist instructed me to. I learned this information at the ENT and allergist, where they gave me both an AIRQ questionnaire, and took the time to correct my mistakes with the PFT test to get a more accurate results, and surprise surprise, I'm a severe asthmatic both because of and despite the doctors dismissing me.

I'm just thinking to myself, why on earth do doctors flat out refuse to test concerned patients with something as simple as a PFT test or even a peak flow meter to track one's average peak flow if one cannot afford a formal PFT? Patients are willing to jump through so many hoops for the doctors to take them seriously, yet the doctors don't even let them try until their asthma gets too bad to function in their normal lives.

I'm sick and tired of professionals assuming people do not have asthma simply because they do not have a history of asthma, and failing to assess the symptoms patience experience in the present. Yeah, I may not have had asthma yesterday, but I have breathing problems today, and you refuse to even check my lungs because I could breathe yesterday? This backwards logic is too common and it's not even my 22 year old angst coming out. It's frustration and fury at the people who are supposed to be the professionals. Instead of doing their jobs to investigate health problems, they simply are fixed, stubborn, and straight up hard-headed in believing that their patients could never have asthma period, or never could have asthma because they never had a diagnostic history of asthma because of the professionals' lack of testing.

I'm not saying "down with America's medical system, all doctors suck", not at all. A handful of my family members are doctors, and majoring in criminal justice, I am a fan of some aspects of the healthcare system, such as policies like HIPAA, the fact that our medicinal practices are relatively advanced compared to other countries, and the fact that doctors and other professionals are mandatory reporters in child maltreatment cases, among other things.

However, there are way too many medical professionals and even pulmonary professionals who are dismissive of people's concerns about being unable to breathe properly simply because they can't hear anything (not hearing anything wrong yet struggling to breathe is actually a symptom of asthma in itself), or because they do not have a diagnostic medical history of asthma solely because the doctors refused to properly take the time to test them in the first place. The doctors are the ones responsible for developing and keeping one's medical history. Why does one have to have asthma written down in a history book just for you to take them seriously in the present? A history of asthma in the family or in one's life is not the only indicator of asthma. Asthma is characterized by (DUH): being unable to breathe due to tightness and swelling of the airways! This can happen at any point in one's life with or without a history. So why not test patients when they ask you to and will pay you to?